Having a good time - 3 December 2008

Another day, another series of dollars spent without much for return. After yesterday, where I dropped objects left and right, broke a plate (and cut myself on a tiny sliver-shard cleaning it up), I can empathize with the idea that people are apparently too stupid to flee an out-of-control fire when there are extinguishers around, because we think we can take it. although, removing the extinguishers seems like an equally stupid move. Maybe more people need more fire suppresion training at their workplaces so they can identify a fire that they can handle and one they can’t?

The Internets come to my rescue, however. At least I didn’t lose 130,000 C-cup inflatable breasts at sea. And I’m not trying to sue the city and police department for damages because I was part of a mob that killed a Wal-Mart worker.

Internationally, Opposition in Thailand declared victory and said they would vacate the main airport as the courts declared the ouster of the Prime Minister. So will the PM vacate peacefully and we’ll have a peaceful transition? Don’t know.

Pirates set sights on ship too big and well-defended for them - a United States cruise ship. Pirates repulsed, although some questions like “What was the cruise ship doing there?” and “Were they really trying?” appear.

Iraq and Kuwait will cooperate in patrolling the watters near both countries, which is good. An Kuwaiti subcontractor to KBR has been holding workers in a windowless warehouse for quite some time now, not paying their wages or sending them home until investigated. That’s very bad. Even if they were trying to find them work in Iraq, it looks like the people coming in were sold on big promises and then find out there’s nothing there, so they’re stuck in conditions that potentially violate the law while they wait. It could be a prelude to human trafficking, it could be misbehavior, it could be bad circumstances. Once brought to light, the company is moving swiftly to correct things, thankfully.

More explosives found in Mumbai train station, defused, tensions still high between India and Pakistan, with India declaring there’s no doubt the attackers came from Pakistan, through Pakistan, and had Pakistani backers.

Finally, A lot of nations sign a cluster-bomb ban. Noticeably absent - the United States, Russia, and China. Cluster bombs are the new mines, and the intent of the signing is to convince, pressure, and shame the non-signers into joining on.

In the domestic sphere, Fear, fear, fear, terror, terror, nuclear Iran, and thus, the President-elect must treat the whole Middle East and not isolate Iran, as the previous administrator tried to do.

Perhaps as an indication of pragmatism as opposed to ideology (or, the Obama Divide), several conservatives have significant praise for the Obama Cabinet displayed thus far. The lone Republican in the Cabinet so far has indicated he's okay with getting troops out and closing Gunatanamo, so that pragmatism might make for ideologically sound things getting done. The Obama Divide now appears to be that nobody is certain that the President-elect will be the person they want him to be when in office - too pragmatic and centrist for the progressive wing, and too liberal and far-out for the center and the right. Even if he doesn't get to the perfect progressive haven, take joy in the Obama victory, if you're lefty, and then continue your work organizing people into political powerhouses, to the service of or in spite of the President. Or if on the right or more centrist, batten down the hatches for fear that the President-elect will be exactly as he says he will be (if you can figure that out), although he won’t show it immediately. If the President-elect wants to get broad consensus for change, he’ll have to find a way of resolving the tension in one way or another. Probably through sacrificing some of the most progressive things until support appears for them, in exchange for crushing several of the dream states of the center and right.

The Georgia Senate race recount resolves...Republican, stopping serious speculation of sixty. So be it.

Fox News person Chris Wallace takes offense to Ron Howard's comparison of the outgoing administrator to Richard Nixon, saying that Nixon did all his abuses for personal gain, while the outgoing administrator was at least trying to protect the country when he did his abuses (if you believe they are abuses, he says - nice foot-in-mouth there), and the absence of attacks is proof that our protections are working.

Is Sarah Palin still wearing clothes she said she would donate after the campaign was done?

Chrsitian University official arrested for soliciting sex in public, which makes for great headlines, but also some thinking about why the government wants to regulate and arrest adults for trying to arrange a consensual sex act...and now I’m wondering why we have laws against public nudity and sex acts. This was obviously not explained to me enough past the point of the factor that most people probably don’t want to see another person naked in public for it to stick. Far more worthy of a little laugh is the pastor who wanted his married congregation to have sex once or more each day for seven days...and couldn't practice what he preached. The single people, of course, couldn’t do any of this, and were thus left unhappy. Still, encouraging as always to see Christians promoting the value of a healthy sex drive, even if they want people married first. Now, if they were only secure enough in their own religion not to make a giant fuss about a Bible that reinterprets all the relationships to be homosexual instead of heterosexual.

In opinions, The WSJ's negative view of the selection of Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State revolves around one thing - William Jefferson Clinton. And maybe one other thing, but that’s feeling that the President-elect won’t be able to contain all the people he’s selected and get them to work for him.

Brett Stephens returns to "The mainsream media aids and abets terrorists by uncritically printing claims of abuse by things that the terrorists don't like", as a point about how printing these things then generate riots and attacks and other terror incidents and recruitments. While careful only talk about things that were thinly sourced or later turned out to be lies, I wonder if Mr. Stephens would also support squelching those things that are properly sourced, like Danish cartoons, for the fear that they, too, will generate riots.

The WSJ points out that Republicans cannot run on the anti-immigration platform, if the statistics of the legislative races from the last cycle are any indication - those who wanted to wedge it lost. Plus, the Hispanic vote went heavily against the Republicans. So while they might be able to count on most people still beign socially conservative, the Republican Party platform in general is doing a very good imitation of “rocks fall, everything dies”.

Walter E. Williams asks the "Is our children learning" question, and has the studies that say, "Uh, no". The point, though, is that the uneducated populace then leaves itself open to political hucksterism and believing that government can do things that it cannot, including bailouts and taking over people’s lives to suit the political whims of the elites. It’s a sheep accusation, but I’m not sure whether it’s “Fix the school system so that people know when they’re being hoodwinked and can demand accountability en masse, so they stop bleating” or “Fix the methods that let us elect and appoint shysters and slick personality packages to power over us, so that we can stay contended sheep knowing that we’ve put honest and moral people in office.” I’m guessing it’s not the second, since Mr. Williams hates government control, but I didn’t really see a strong push for the first, to get the school systems back in shape so that the children do learn the useful bits they need for life on the outside. I suspect, though, a lot of what might help fix the context of school, so that students can focus on their studies, rather than whether or not the heat will be on, whether there will be something to eat, whether they’ll get mugged, shanked, drug-dealt, or raped on the way home, or even wehther there will be a home to go to, might take some of that government control and meddling.

In technology, 3D HoloTV by 2018, experts suggest, which tells me that entertainment drives technology (we passed the point where a computer could handle all the daily office tasks a long time ago), rehabilitation after stroke has a longer window of opportunity than previously thought (the article mentions a robotic device, but then gives no details, so I wonder if it's actually important what is used, just that an object gets used), making lithium batteries better, blocking microRNA to reverse heart disease in mice, while ensuring that we get sufficient vitamin D, claims made that one can use a direct tail wind to power a vehicle to fly faster than the wind powering it, lowering the albedo of the ice caps through dust, soot, and pollution makes them melt faster, and the bioluminescent fungi of Japan. Pretty!

Last for tonight, Might Is Right, based on a 1927 edition. A place where religion endlaves people and siphons their gold, to be taken away by the most enterprising person and held by those who can defend it, until enterprisiginly sacked themselves. Where ideals are not participatory, but indoctrinated and the cause and justification of the world’s evil today. If that’s to ranty and incoherent or offensive to you, there's 2 lbs of marijuana just discovered in a shaman's grave that will make things much more interesting - it’s still good after 2700 years, too, or intended to be that way.

VEWPRF (ish) and the First Amendment - A Potentially Incoherent and Logically Unsound Post

Ah, it’s December, and that means the VEWPRF are finally safe to be talked about. And that also means that the War on Christmas folk are back - like James Dobson, who wants you to know which stores haven't been properly Christian, Bill'O, who after having come out in defense of the separation of church and state, is now back to the front lines of the war, and Michael Reagan, also a front-line solider in the War.

Kathryn Jean Lopez thinks that the outrage against the LDS church because of their large role in Proposition 8 is a warning that all religions will soon be under siege for doing things according to their beliefs. She’s late, I think, if she’s not accounting for all the doctors making a fuss because they want to avoid making recommendations for or performing abortion procedures, prescribing birth control, the pharmacists that want to avoid filling it, et cetera. If that makes people feel they need to get their Armor of God on and go save Christmas... or admit they want to punish teenage women for being sexual beings, prevent homosexuals from raising children or receiving the protections of the law outlined in marriage, decry other religions as idolaters, infidels, or otherwise unblessed and unchosen, and live in perpetual fear that at some day, they will be the minority again, well, good luck to you.

Did you know? Kentucky's Homeland Security office is required by law to state that God helps the country stay safe, and that government cannot do the job alone? And furthermore, that a Kentucky lawmaker is mad that the annual report did not do this? Well, no court challenge, so I suppose there’s been no avenue to analyze on First Amendment grounds.

Which is where all of this has led and is leading to, the First Amendment and religion. Christopher Merola expounds upon this idea, believing the idea of "freedom from religion" is a perversion of the First Amendment. On the same tack, although trying to find a ridiculous example to use as the leading point, Chuck Norris also feels that things have gotten out of hand.

Setting aside Merola’s rhetorical flourishes designed to distract and distort (the ACLU founder was a Communist! A five year-old girl was scolded for prayer!), the premise is that a judge’s ruling in 1947 and a couple key rulings afterward have warped the First Amendment from “freedom of religion” to “freedom from religion”, where the lowest common denominator is to have no religious anything at all when there’s a governmental entity or action nearby, most notably adding on to this 1962 case, later spun back by a 1991 case, that brings things around to the free exercise part that currently prohibits organized prayer in school, on instruction time. Apparently, though, despite being able to individually pray in schools, the expression of religious beleifs in school, or many other public forums, in writing or in other assignments, is still cause for bad grades, silencing, and other forms of “belief discrimination”. Taking those events as a whole, let’s whittle away those that can be explained by other causes, such as poor writing contributing to a poor grade, regardless of topic, expressing nonscientific views in a nonscientific manner in a science class and refusing to budge, and the entire class of events that run opposite to the idea of “But do not pray as the hypocrites do...instead, pray to your Father in secret, and your Father, who sees things that are secret, will reward you.” The people waving signs that say “All Fags Go To Hell, And You Are Too”? Permitted on the campus to wave their signs and shout hellfire and brimstone. I could almost synchronize my calendar by them, knowing which day it was based on which sign was out. Zo. I’d also include in the “big, ostentatious, and disruptive displays” someone wearing a crucifix around their neck that would serve just as well on a church altar. Having stripped away most of the things that make media attention and fuss, what’s left? Muslim students getting harassed by peers, and possibly instructors, for wearing hijab? Non-monotheists afraid to wear their religious symbols because peers, and possibly isntructors and administrators, wouldn’t udnerstand it at all and will still assume some sort of dangerous cultlike behavior? Bans on all displays of religious symbols in public space? Those things are fruitful grounds for First Amendment stuff. I’m betting it feels like a siege on Christians or a War on Christmas or what have you because of the fact that Christians are the majority religion in this country. If the country were more religiously balanced, then perhaps there would be a bigger scatter on cases, and I could find Merola’s and Norris’s points more compelling. Is there anywhere that would serve as an example/counterexample to my statement?

Beyond the face issue, this “belief discrimination” tack sounds an awful lot like “the evul libruls are indoctrinating” argument, excepting in this case, it’s atheism/secular humanism that’s the liberal agenda, intended to get all the children to forsake the religion of their parents, become godless, and crash the country into the ground because we lack morality by not having God. Both of these ideas are ridiculous. Parents have much more opportunity to indoctrinate their children than the schools do - the law compels education, but doesn’t say how these days. Parents compel church attendance from an early age, and good luck trying to wiggle out of that one until you’ve had quite a few years of instruction. Second, while God may be a necessary invention, I have sufficient trust in the course of human civilization that even without God, humanity would have developed necessary morals to permit peaceful coexistence - once banded together, raising crops, and beginning their specialized tasks, humans have to depend on each other for survival. Which menas that bashing the head in of the only guy who knows how to make fire because you want his woman means death or enslavement for you and your tribe at the hands of another tribe. The tribe that cooperates wisn. That covers most of the social commandments of most religions. Beyond that, it’s usually purity laws and rituals for worship. Civilization built that way might not resemble anything we have in our sliver of the multiverse, but I suspect civilization would have still developed.

Anyway, so I’m feeling that before the majority complains lots about how everyone is against them, maybe we could start with making the minorities feel welcome and comfortable enough to practice and protest for their rights with support from the majority, and it might turn out that the things the majority is complaining about get resolved by being forced to take a look at the bigger picture. I could also be wrong, and that it’s all already there, but I haven’t seen it, because of a media-distorted lens or something like it.